


the Cutting Edge

by cortchuzska



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/M, Knifeplay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-06
Updated: 2013-01-06
Packaged: 2017-11-23 23:26:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/627692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cortchuzska/pseuds/cortchuzska
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They had that much in common: Stark ghosts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the Cutting Edge

“As of late, wandering in the dead of night can be quite treacherous, for those unfamiliar with Winterfell.”

“I couldn't sleep, my lady.”

It was not for him to ask her what business a lone, defenceless woman was about at the wolf hour. Looking for him, apparently.

“We don't need you to lose other fingers to frostbite.” He didn't realize he was shaking.

“A hot cup of mulled wine will do you god.” She added, ever so softly; but there was nothing soft about her forward manners, nor in her finely carved features. Barbrey Dustin was sharp, and hard and unyielding as it could go.

“As my lady wishes.”

He meekly followed her, trudging silently between high snow walls. She led him to her chambers, and beckoned her men-at-arms to let him in. An even warmth welcomed them; she was a resourceful woman and had got someone to fix the plumbing of the Winterfell of old in her rooms. No less welcoming were the spicy smell of wine steeping in an earthen pitcher by the fireplace, and a bowl of gruel, with honey and butter and nutmeg. It was likely another trap, to snatch him from Lord Ramsay, and he would pay dearly for it.

“I find a warm bath most soothing, when you can't sleep. You'd better take one, and stop roaming around.”

“My lady... I... The kitchen... Need not to wake them up for me.”

“There is flowing warm water from the hot springs within, it never cools.” She offered and he had learnt some people – people that close to Lord Bolton - couldn't be refused.

He peeled off his gloves, took off his boots sitting on the stone tub edge, tentatively unlaced his doublet. There was a stool, but he feared soiling it with his filthy rags and let them puddle on the floor instead. The bath walls must have been hot, yet he felt goose prickles on his naked skin. Theon moved to his breeches fastenings. He dared not look back. _If she didn't look, it would not be that bad; if he didn't know she was looking at him, it could not be that bad._

Beggars were not choosers; and he was not even allowed to beg. He clambered awkwardly into the tub, and soaked in, how long he could not tell. _Maybe, if he waited long enough, he could slid back into his clothes unnoticed._

She shoved a jug of mulled wine into his trembling hands.

“Just don't...” He gasped, horror stricken at his unspoken words. _Never, ever forget you are theirs, to do with as they please; and any plea, will only tighten their merciless grip on you._

“Your clothes were threadbare and stank. I had them burned.” Lady Barbrey had already gotten out of hers. “On the morrow you'll have new ones.”

Her final tone brokered little argument; he could no longer nurse his wine, swallowed it and had to rise, and shuffled to her chamber. Black wolf pelts were strewn on her bed, and she wrapped one around his shoulder.

If life had not been kind upon Barbrey Dustin, it hardly showed. Her pale skin was thin and lacked youth glow, yet her unbraided greying hair shone warmly in a thick tumble about her shoulder. Her small breasts were more perk than soft, barely rounded by age; her flat belly bore no stretch marks, and her tights muscles were still firm, courtesy of long daily rides, for sure much more than his own. Lady Barbrey was likely older than his own mother, but he felt thrice her years, all of them winter.

Theon Greyjoy would not have counted her among his finest lays, but would have tumbled her all the same. Now he knew better: she was the same woman who didn't conceal her scorn toward Lord Ramsay, the woman who Roose Bolton sort of esteemed, and warily trusted: a woman to be trodden carefully around.

She could have chosen a husband – _a man_ – if she had needed one; but he guessed she had lost long ago her interest in men; to her they were not even vaguely amusing, but merely hindrances. Even naked, she was as stiff as when clad in sable and furs black and shiny as a carrion crow feathers; her eyes were as flinty as a bird of prey ones, and she was as well more interested in bones, in the dead rather than in the living. Maybe that was why _he,_ who was more of a corpse, was in her room, lying on her bed.

Barbrey answered his unvoiced query. “Here in Winterfell, you are the closest thing to a Stark.”

“The lady Arya.” No one could tell who was listening; and that could be as well another cruel jape.

“Of course, a Stark.” Barbrey balanced on her fists and knelt by his side.

He had forcedly become good at reading faces, and by the way her thin lips disappeared, he could tell she was smiling: the girl had been in her care before her marriage to Lord Ramsay, and they both knew she was a ruse.

Suddenly steel flicked in her hand. Barbrey was holding a dainty hunting knife, with a mother-of-pearl hilt, the kind a great lord's heir would give as a love token, the sort he, when he was Theon, would have given to a girl pleasing him in bed and not so base-born as not to need a bit of fawning.

The blade pressed lightly on his throat apple, and slid slowly to his navel, prickling him. His eyes widened with terror, and he couldn't help heaving his chest with hurried breaths, cutting himself against her knife. Its edge was so so fierce its licks were bites.

She set a soothing hand on his hip. “Be still. I never meant to draw blood.” Being just _touched_ was worse than being hurt; yet he gathered himself and obeyed.

She leant on his chest, moping gently at his nicks with a cloth soaked in hot mulled wine; she had no smell at all, only the crisp chilly feel of falling snow in a moonless night.

Her mouth vanished again, and he felt the cold steel of a blade flat resting on his nipple, stilled and braced himself while Barbrey drew a pink circle around it with her knife point, just scraping his skin.

“That's how it's made. Had you moved, I could have gashed deeply, leaving only a flap of skin, and you would have left me no choice but to snap it with my fingers; or maybe tear it off with my own teeth.” Barbrey had still all of them, perfect and pearly-white.

She laid on her tongue the blade, marred by his blood blotches, and and licked it clean; the knife glistened again in its pristine shine.

“A keepsake from Brandon. I have whetted it, every night since: the Boltons are not the only ones keen on sharp blades. You reminded me of him, when I saw you riding south with Robb Stark.”

Barbrey put the knife on her bedside table, sat cross-legged, with her arms around her knees, and smiled.

“Tell me about late Lord Eddard.”


End file.
